Well back after some great holidays, but for us it's also great to be able to cook for ourselves as well.
This is a recipe from
Simply recipes who makes us so hungry each time we read the blog. After we read the ricotta meatball blog we knew what we were having for dinner and after a bit of shopping we were armed with the goods.
With the preparation done, our two bowls of stuff were ready to go
The bread cubes were mixed into the mince and seasonings, then the eggs and ricotta (well, cottage cheese in our case, still delicious just maybe not as rich) were added to the mince.
First visit to the oven, until they were golden.
Before being rolled around a little ...
and covered in tomato sauce.
Summer salad greens from viewplaza,
and a pot of soft white polenta
and what a great dinner !! Sometimes one of the greatest pleasure is just being able to cook and eat at home!
Good use of the Gourmet Traveller! and the dinner table was set.
We served the meatballs over soft white polenta, which is a type of corn meal, super tasty!
Pork Ricotta Meatballs in Tomato Sauce Recipeadapted from Simply Recipes.com
Ingredients
300g ground pork mince
300g beef mince
80g cured Japanese pork product (not exactly sure what it was, but it looked and tasted delicious!)
1 loaf soft & fresh white bread, cubed, crusts removed first
1/2 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 1/2 teaspoons Kosher salt
1 tub of cottage cheese
3 eggs, lightly beaten
Olive oil
1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil leaves
if fresh basil is not available, add a tablespoon of dried basil to the tomatoes before adding to the meatballs
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
Method
1 In a large bowl, add the pork, beef mince, unidentifiable cure pork productand bread cubes, parsley, oregano, fennel, red pepper flakes, and salt. Use your hands to mix until the ingredients are evenly distributed. Do not over-work.
2 Whisk the beaten eggs and cottage cheese together in a separate bowl until there are no more large clumps of ricotta. Pour into the bowl of the meat mixture. Mix with your hands until just incorporated. Again, do not over-mix.
If you want, to test seasoning, you can take a small bit of the mix, form into a patty, and heat in a small skillet on the stovetop until cooked through. Depending on how this test patty tastes to you, add more herbs, chili, or salt to taste to the meat mixture. Keep meat mixture in refrigerator while doing this.
3 Preheat oven to 200°C. Coat the bottom of a large roasting pan with olive oil. Form meatballs in your hand, about 1 1/2-inches in diameter, using about 3 Tbsp of the mixture to form each meatball. Arrange in pan so there is some space between them. If too crowded they will steam and not brown.
4 Roast meatballs in the oven for about 30 minutes, turning the meatballs after about 20 minutes, until the meatballs are beginning to brown.
5 Remove pan from oven. Use a metal spatula to dislodge meatballs from being stuck to the bottom of the pan. Add the crushed tomatoes to the pan. Carefully cover the pan with aluminum foil (carefully because the pan is still hot!) Return the pan to the oven. Lower the heat to 150°C. Cook for an additional hour to 1 1/2 hours.
Sprinkle basil into sauce before serving.
Makes about 24 meatballs.
Serves 5-6.
Soft White polenta Recipe
1/2 c white polenta
2 1/2 c milk
Parmasean
Salt & white pepper
Knob of butter
Bring the milk to the boil, sprinkle the polenta into the milk while stirring (you need to sprinkle and stir rather than just dump it in to avoid lumps).
Cook out for about five minutes untill the polenta has thickened up enough to hold the stirring lines.
Finish off by stirring in the knob of butter, a good whack of grated parmesan and salt and pepper.
Enjoy!
With any left over polenta, spread onto a flat tray and let set over night. The next day cut into chips and grill or deep fry. Yummy!
We enjoyed the rest of our meatballs the next day in a crust baguette with shredded cabbage. Yum!
